by Jeff Carson
“Wh-what are you doing?”
“I need these.”
“What are you going to do?” she asked. “You have to be careful with those guys from the pub. I’m serious. They are probably killers.”
“Yeah, I know.”
She shook her head with glistening eyes. “What are you going to do?”
“It will come to me.” He picked up the plates and put them in the sink. “They beat my brother over the head and strangled him to death. And they beat Matthew Rosenwald’s head in. Making it look like my brother did the whole thing.”
He fetched the blades from the table, walked back to the counter, and put them back in the wooden housing.
“I’m going to just bring this down to my brother’s apartment, okay? I’m sorry, you’re going to have to get another set. If anything happens, I don’t want anything tied to you. And come to think of it, it really would be better if I could just borrow the scooter tonight.”
Chapter 38
Faint ambient light from the city beyond the piazza streamed into his brother’s otherwise pitch dark bedroom. Wolf was certain he was being watched, so he’d made a show of walking around in his underwear, turning off the lights in the entire apartment, as if he’d been going to sleep early.
He dressed quickly, putting on the darkest clothes he had, without overtly looking like a cat burglar. The two most important things he wore were tucked into his socks—two kitchen knives, the blades loosely covered with folded paper towel sheathes to protect his skin.
He patted the knives, twisting his ankles to test the tuck-job, adjusted his socks, and went to the balcony. The piazza was ninety degrees to his right and out of sight, on the other side of the A-ridged roof. The roof extended straight out at least fifty yards. He could hear the murmur of a bustling Friday night crowd and see bright lights pouring upward against the humid air, thick with swarming insects.
There was no moonlight shining on the ceramic roof. It was dark, difficult to get a sense of the exact angle of pitch. He knew it wasn’t too steep to navigate, no more than thirty degrees, but steep enough to keep his heart rate racing, and wet enough to quicken his pulse even more. If it was a ski slope, it would have certainly been labeled black diamond, he knew that.
The roof butted right up against the balcony to his lower right. Ceramic tiles could be brittle, and he had no idea how old and brittle these were. He also knew that old ceramic tiles that were wet after a rainstorm were probably slick with a thin film of clay.
He looked over the edge to his left, away from the roof to the narrow walking alleyway below. It was far. Three vaulted-ceilinged floors up from the hard cobblestone ground. He stared for a full minute, not seeing a single soul.
He gritted his teeth, gave a sharp exhale, and stepped over the railing. He put his left foot on the roof and gradually placed more and more weight on it while still straddling the balcony. There was a creak. He placed more weight still and tested the traction of his left foot.
Satisfied, he stepped his other foot over, and made the entire transition to the roof, laying forward in a low push-up position, on his hands and tiptoes.
Wolf thought briefly of slipping over the edge, hearing the gradual rush of air, becoming so loud as to be deafening right before he hit the ground with an unfathomable pain. He shook his head with a humorless chuckle and began climbing up.
Small scrapes and creaks accompanied every movement up the kiln-hardened tiles, though none moved more than a few millimeters under his weight. He shuffled quickly up toward the ridge of the roof that was a straight line of shadow against the bright light of the piazza beyond. He stopped just before the top, not wanting to risk being seen from the other side. He got to the soles of his feet, stooping with his right hand in contact with the tiles, and made his way parallel to the ridgeline.
Step by step, foot-by-foot, the tiles held up beneath him as he carefully crept along.
Stupidly, impatience overwhelmed him, so he stood up with bent knees, arms out for balance. He looked to his right. He couldn’t see the other side of the roof, so he knew no one could see him from below. He began walking faster toward the dark void that was still twenty yards ahead.
No more than three paces into his light-footed trot, his left foot gave way, sweeping violently down to the left with a ceramic crack. His right foot shuffled forward in mid stride and caught on a tile as his body weight plummeted toward the roof. His right knee bent, smashed into his chest, bounced him up to the left, and into an uncontrollable fall.
He hit the roof with a hollow thud on his entire left side. For a moment, he stalled, planking parallel to the roof ridgeline, shifting slowly, unstoppably into a roll toward the roof edge. He extended his right leg out and up to stop it, but it was no use.
Without thinking, he kicked up with his left leg, extended his right arm straight above his head, and twisted hard to his right, toward the drop. A two hundred seventy degree turn later, he split his legs and arms into a wide X, toes and hands digging for purchase, belly against the wet roof. He landed in a cacophony of cleaving tiles, which tumbled like the sound of plates sliding off a waiter tray, into the darkness, now just a foot to his left.
His body skidded a few inches as he gritted his teeth, digging his toes and fingertips into the wet ceramic, finally stopping with less than a foot to spare. Panting now, he forced himself to take a deep breath, then heard a few distant splatters of tiles hitting the cobblestones below, giving him yet another shot of adrenaline.
Ten seconds later he managed to get back to a position perpendicular to the crest of the roof. This time he went all the way to the peak, willing to trade being seen from within the piazza for living to see another day. Straddling the crest, he walked low and quick the remainder of the distance to the end of the roof.
As he approached the black void, growing discouragement gave way to instant relief as his eyes adjusted, revealing a one-meter drop onto a flat-topped black roof below. He could see puddles reflecting the city-lit clouds. The roof extended twenty feet, and then there was a steel rectangular structure at the edge.
He slunk over the edge and made his way there.
It was a fire escape. Steps zigzagged all the way down to the ground, or so he assumed. He wasn’t about to test the strength of the railing by leaning over to see.
It wobbled and creaked with each step, but he was on the ground safely within moments.
His body tingled with adrenaline as his feet hit the ground. He turned to look back up at the stairway. He shook his head with wide eyes. Cold-blooded conviction pounding in his veins. Now he knew. This is exactly how the murderers got out of John’s apartment that night.
The piazza was just around the corner. He walked the opposite way, through a narrow gap, and to where Cristina had told him to go earlier. The familiar white scooter was parked right where she said it would be. He cranked the key, fired up the kazoo-sounding engine, and took off down the side street.
Chapter 39
He rode the scooter as fast as it could take him to the Merate Observatory. The gate in the rear of the property was wide open, just like every other time he’d seen it, so he planted the scooter in the corn and walked in. Checking the back door with a tug, he was surprised as bright light poured out, opening without any resistance.
Walking in like a stalker would have drawn unwanted attention. So he walked in like he belonged.
Opening the door, he strode across the brightly lit telescope room floor while looking down at his hooded sweatshirt zipper, making a mild show of struggling to unzip it. A man at a computer terminal looked to him over a pushed down set of reading glasses.
Wolf nodded and gave a quick wave as the man looked toward him. Wolf didn’t break stride, walking through the big room and into the hallway beyond.
“Ciao,” the man said distractedly, already turning his head back to the computer screen.
Wolf veered to the right, down the hallway toward Vlad’s office, and allowed himself a
quick look over his shoulder. No one was in sight along the hall that extended in the opposite direction, but a few lights were on. He glanced at his watch. 8:44 p.m. For a Friday night, it seemed positively bustling. But then again, it was an observatory. Where work was done at night.
He walked past an occupied office on the left. Inside, a man sat with his face to a computer screen. There was an Asian man looking over his shoulder—Dr. Chang. Wolf passed unobserved and continued down the hallway. Blinds were drawn tight over Vlad’s hall windows, lights on inside, and his door was shut. Wembly’s office was dark, looking shut tight for the night.
Wolf stopped, swiveled another look down the hall, and pressed his ear lightly against Vlad’s office door. There was no sound.
He twisted the handle and entered fast.
Before he finished shutting the door, he already knew he was in big trouble.
Chapter 40
Nothing inside the office moved but the swirling digital lines on the computer screen. Nothing. Including Vlad.
Vlad sprawled motionless, directly face down. His head was tilted back, face balanced on his nose and gaping jaw, which was mashed into the terrazzo floor.
What bothered Wolf was not Vlad’s lifeless body, but what was wrapped around his neck—a shiny black leather belt. A shiny black belt of a design he might have remembered seeing in his brother’s closet earlier in the week.
His mind raced.
He looked at the computer screen. The lines had just disappeared, blanking out to a black sleep-mode screen. He snapped his head to Vlad and bent down, feeling his cheek with the back of his hand. The body was still warm.
Wolf stood up with a jolt and turned toward the door. He pulled it open with his sweatshirt pocket covered hand and scrubbed clean the exterior knob. Suddenly, he heard a faint two-tone siren somewhere in the distance. Turning to the exterior window, his breath quickened when the flicker of red and blue flashed through the closed blinds, and the siren become louder.
Wolf sprinted down the hall, past the Asian scientist who was now taking a long swill of soda in his office doorway.
“Hey!” Chang’s voice called as Wolf blew past him.
Wolf ran hard through the telescope room and out the door. He stopped outside with a skid and lunged back to the handle, wiping both inside and outside knob quickly with his sweatshirt before turning and sprinting as fast as he could out the gate.
Red and blue pulses dimly lit the cornrows in front of him as he ran. They were shining from behind him, on top of a quickly accelerating vehicle. He dove straight left into the cornfield, this time not touching a single stalk as he dove into the row.
The siren was now muted, but he heard the fast crunch of tires, and the brightening strobe of red and blue told him the vehicle was getting closer by the second.
Wolf inched to the edge of the corn and stole a glance just in time to see a Carabinieri Alfa Romeo Gazelle whipping into the rear property of the observatory. He waited for the next car, which never came. He held his breath and listened. A faint familiar clack of the observatory door told him the officer had probably entered the building.
None of it made any sense. The body wasn’t even cold yet, not even discovered by his fellow employees milling about. Wolf instinctually twisted and looked behind him, half expecting to see whoever killed Vlad sneaking up on him. Nothing but corn.
He stepped out and craned his neck to look over the corn at the building, seeing only flashing blue and red against the cornrows lining the road. Faint radio noises came from the vehicle inside the property.
He ran down the road to the scooter and pulled it out of the corn. Then he paused, looking and listened again. Nothing had changed. He pushed it up the dirt road, away from the observatory grounds, until he reached the crest of the rise where the pipe had been found. With a quick look back, he jumped on and coasted toward the lake—toward the narrow trail they’d navigated earlier in the day. Toward the crime scene.
That thought made him jam the brakes, skidding to a stop. Whether or not the crime scene would be manned was a toss-up. If he were the one giving orders at a crime scene in Colorado, he would have a couple men down there. Probably not at the trailhead below, but more near the actual crime scene. He knew there was a farm road to the left and to the right at the bottom of the small hill ahead, right where the narrow trail began. He coasted forward.
The narrow path at the bottom had yellow tape across the entrance, but no officer in sight. He fired up the scooter and gave it a small rev that echoed in the still night, sounding like a handful of pebbles in a tin can. He chose the road to the left, toward the road he took here, which was also the road the Caribinieri had just screamed in on. But he had to get back to Lecco. There was still a lot to do there.
Chapter 41
Wolf got off the hissing scooter and eyed The Albastru Pub across the piazza. It was lively, chalk full of patrons, with merry laughter gushing from the pub doorway as it opened and closed with coming and going patrons.
Wolf walked past the front of the pub and glanced inside the large windows. A thick and solid bartender worked behind the counter. His huge arms were heavily inked, pulling taps and pushing glasses to people crowded around the bar. A young waitress with a face that sparkled with piercings weaved in and out of standing customers, expertly balancing an impossible number of drinks on a tray.
Just as Wolf got closest, a group of young men wearing soccer jerseys charged out with cigarettes in their mouths and sloshing mugs of beer in their hands. They were raucously arguing, probably about whatever soccer match was on the televisions inside.
Wolf slowed his pace, stalling to get a longer look inside. He dug in his pocket and pulled out a cigarette from the pack he’d borrowed from Cristina. In his experience, a box of cigarettes was a prop with many uses. Never mind the toll his lungs would pay. “Excuse me, do you have a light?” He flicked his thumb, ignoring the lighter he’d borrowed as well in his pocket.
Two of the bigger guys turned toughly, eyeing him up and down. “Yes, I have one!” Another guy stepped forward with a friendly smile and extended lighter. “Where are you from?”
Just then Wolf saw Cezar’s tall head bobbing behind the bar, high above the other patrons. Wolf took the lighter and turned his back to the window.
“Tijuana.” Wolf lit his cigarette, tossed the lighter back without looking, and walked away. The soccer fan mumbled something like asshole in Italian.
Wolf took a left and walked down the street. The pub noise faded into the distance as he strolled, sucking on the cigarette.
Thirty yards down, he turned onto a cobblestone street, and then took the next left into a dark rain-soaked alley. He made his way through a slot canyon of thousand-year-old buildings. They were seamlessly connected, each with unique, and dark, arching stone doorways. Wolf continued up the street at a cautious speed, making his way toward where he pictured the rear of the pub to be.
Ahead was a blind curve. Beyond it, a bright glow that reflected off the wet ground. He tossed the cigarette in a puddle and walked ahead.
Wolf stopped when he saw two men standing in a brightly lit garage doorway, sucking on cigarettes.
He ducked into a sunken doorway and studied them further.
The two men were wiry, much like Cezar, as if they didn’t eat much or had the metabolism of ferrets. They didn’t look particularly dangerous, neither being tall nor muscular, but they were likely raised on the streets of a country he had no knowledge of. Whether from Italy or Romania, he didn’t know the skills these guys brought to the table. They were heavily tattooed, and his gut told him they weren’t just a couple of dishwashers out for a smoke break.
The shorter of the two guys was telling an animated story while the other one stood still, chuckling silently, looking self-consciously at the cigarette in his hand. Neither looked to have weapons.
They finished their cigarettes, tossed them onto the wet street, and stayed there, like they were going to wait for so
mething. Then after a minute they walked inside the garage.
Wolf put another cigarette in his mouth and walked toward the bright garage.
As he got closer, he heard two men jabbering in Romanian.
Wolf walked to the door and squinted a look inside. The bright interior of the garage was large enough for one American SUV, or two Italian cars. Boxes were stacked along the walls of either side. It looked to be used as a loading dock for food and supplies. Here they would be offloaded from a truck, stacked, and brought into the restaurant, through a door on the back left corner wall that probably went to a kitchen, judging from the clanking sounds that came from within.
The two men were hard at work pulling full boxes from a haphazard area in the middle of the garage, taping them shut, and stacking them along the walls.
The boxes were brown, of the same dimension he’d seen in the back of Cezar’s truck the night before, and just like the night before, they were filled to the brim with what looked to be stolen electronics.
One of the guys did a double take when he saw Wolf, who was now standing in the garage doorway with a cigarette in his mouth, digging in his pocket with a frustrated look.
They both stood with wide eyes and walked to Wolf, chests out, heads leaned way back and to the side.
“Excuse me,” Wolf said. “Do you have a lighter?” He flicked his thumb.
The shorter guy on the right took the lead, skipping in front of the other guy. “No, no, no, no.” He wagged his finger as he approached Wolf.
Wolf took his left hand out of his pocket and pulled the cigarette out of his mouth with his right. Then he splayed both hands out in a defenseless gesture. “No, sorry, I’m just looking for a lighter!” He pointed wildly to his cigarette.
The small guy put his right hand on Wolf’s chest and pushed gently.
Wolf kept his hands up and shuffled backwards out into the center of the alley, a look of horror now displayed on his face.
